Bailey's Irish Cream Cake

My first attempt at this cake was last night. The only changes to the recipe I made were to use two cake pans instead of three and mixed the eggs and sugar together instead of the sugar in with flour. Oh and I didn't have enough block chocolate so I had to substitute with cocoa powder/butter.

It tastes wonderful. And the cake is HEAVY! So heavy that I want to change the glaze to a lighter whipped sort of frosting. Is it supposed to be heavy? I'm sure it's not supposed to be gritty....any thoughts?

I don't see anything in the recipe that could possibly meet any requirement for leavening so I'd say, assuming nothing's missing from the list, it's intended to be "heavy". The unsweetened chocolate is slightly acidic so it'll react mildly with the soda but not enough to do much for tenderizing the structure of this cake. At the point where it reads "cool slightly", try cooling it slightly more (something close to luke warm) and see if that helps. Also, try using a cake flour in place of the all purpose to reduce the protein (gluten ) in the recipe. For the amount of time you have to beat this batter you're developing a lot of gluten and you don't want that in a cake. If you'd prefer not to bother with cake flour, try replacing about 2/3 cup of your flour with corn starch.